Page 105 of The Truth About Myths
His luggage had been dispatched to the shipping company before the blasted trip to Spain, and he couldn't wait to join his stuff. What time was it anyway? When he retrieved his pocket watch, he touched Isabel's medal. Why hadn't he disposed of it? He told himself the journey had been rushed. He came to the docks straight from the road.
Charles zigzagged to the table and dissolved into a chair. His complexion had a green sheen, and his red hair was matted. That's what the human female did to its male counterpart, Henrique thought disgustingly.
Behind a lady's sweet looks and gentle caresses hid the ruthlessness of a mantis. They wooed the male with a single goal—chop off his head and feast over his brains. That wasn't fair of him. Comparing women with insects. The mantis was actually merciful, its technique fast and painless. What the human female did was much worse. She sucked the male’s marrow and released his breathing carcass into the world.
Dio smiled nervously. "What a superlative day for sailing, don't you think? It invigorates a Portuguese to have the Tramontane wind blowing his coattails."
Henrique glared at his cup. "It is not the Tramontane. It's the Mistral. The day is only superlative in its dismalness. The sun is dismal, the cackle of the gulls is dismal, and this old rickety port is dismal."
Isabel's medal pulsed inside his coat, and he curbed the impulse to hurl it into the ocean.
Pedro clasped Henrique's shoulder and stared into his eyes. "Mozambique robbed us of too much. Never doubt you deserve happiness. Sometimes the best battle strategy is to lower the six-pounders and negotiate."
Griffin exhaled and pulled his eyebrows to his hairline. "This is pointless, Almoster. I told you. Our Dom Juan here isn't in love. Let him go in peace. Husbands from Lisbon to Oporto will enjoy the respite."
Henrique glared at the pretentious Englishman. Unable to come up with a suitable retort, he took another swig of port. He had loved Isabel like Paris loved Helen, like a peasant loves his wife, like a king loves his queen. But it was not enough. She loved her country better. Her duty.
Henrique tugged his neckcloth, cursing the propriety that was ever at odds with the climate. "Are you done meddling? Go back to your wives. I'm ghastly company today."
They ignored him, and a discussion erupted between the well-meaning bastards, with Charles offering a drunken ditty or two. Henrique covered his face with his hands and groaned. His black heart was a vessel of port and emptiness, lashing out, never settling. If there was an Entity above, he hoped It would shut up the noises and allow him to drown his sorrows in peace.
Dio raised his voice above the others. "Gentlemen, he can stay, or he can leave. If he stays, he should go after her. If he leaves, he should forget about her. Either way, he must snap out of this humdrum."
Henrique slapped his drink on the table, sloshing the liquid over the scarred wood. His breaths came in short bursts. "They can speak about it, but you cannot, Diomedes. This is all your fault. You and your myths. I embraced your hero's quest. I saved the country, and I brought back the riches. By all accounts, I should be living in heavenly bliss. Do I sound blissful to you? Because to me, it feels like hell."
Dio raked his finger through his blond curls. "Every hero needs to go through hell. Hercules had to enter Hades' realm to retrieve Cerberus. Dante had to search theinfernofor his Beatriz. Only after the hero faces hell does he learn to be selfless and value what matters. Life is like a river—passion is the water, and duty is the rocky riverbed. Without the riverbed, water sloshes away in aimless pursuits. Without water, the riverbed is just a lonely, dry path."
"Stop. Not another word."
The ship's horn sounded. Henrique pushed to his feet as if bullet-ants had targeted his arse for their lunch. Briskly, he shook his friends' hands and boarded the steamer. Dio shadowed his steps, but Henrique ignored him.
The hours to cast off could not pass soon enough, and he paced the quarter-deck from aft to port and back, his speed increasing at each turn. His legs were charged as if voltaic batteries were strapped to the soles of his feet. He caught the pocket watch for the tenth time and cursed when he saw less than fifteen minutes had passed.
He tried to focus on the fish darting around the pilings, the masts reaching into the sky, the gulls flying overhead, but his eyes, damn their ocular muscles, always found the palace uphill. An Olympus guarded by milky white clouds. He bet she was there now, circled by her devoted ladies, bathing in men's blood and extolling all the advantages of choosing duty and trampling his heart.
With a groan and a tug, the ship cast its moors. The ropes were pulled taut and then released. The droning sound of the steam engine vibrated inside his ears and empty chest.
Dio put himself in his way. "Won't you go to the machine room? The first mate told me it has a hybrid converter, brand new."
Henrique wrestled his gaze from the palace and strode aft. "She robbed me of this as well."
"Are you sure science is your vocation? You should try the stage. You would displace Sarah Bernhardt with your dramatic streak."
Henrique glared at Dio. “If you are so offended by my performance, why are you following me?"
Dio threw his hands in the air and scoffed. "You wish to know why I follow you?"
"I believe it was exactly what I asked." Henrique grabbed the railings, his heart accelerating painfully with each yard the ship gained against the current.
Dio took a step closer, his eyes blazing. "I follow you now, just as I've done since we met. With you, I’ve drunk more in a night than Bacchus in a revelry. I’ve crossed frigid waters and the limits of morality. I’m here because you supported me when my family turned their back on me, and well, black sheep should flock together. And it’s getting harder, I must admit, but I'm here because I care for your miserable hide. Because of all the men I’ve known, you are the most brilliant, and the most stubborn, the bravest—and the least willing to confront his demons. You are generous with your friendship, your money, your vast knowledge—but you are awfully selfish with your heart. So for Christ's sake, take your face out of your arse. Isabel didn't leave you because she wanted to spite you or because she loves you less than you love her. She left to avoid war."
Henrique shook his head, shutting his eyes with enough force to bury his eyelashes in the skin below.
Dio grabbed his arm. "Stop pacing for a second. Would she be the woman you admire if she had allowed Alfonso to sail without trying to convince him to desist?"
An anguished howl burst from Henrique’s throat. "Don't you think I know all this? It’s eating my insides and messing up with my legs so I cannot stay still. I screwed up. There's no other word for it." He knew the instant Pedro left the tower, he had made a colossal mistake, and it was killing him. The Isabel he loved wouldn't always sacrifice their love for duty, but he could depend on her to always do what was right. "I'm a blackguard."
"And she is a brilliant, courageous woman. No better consort for my Portuguese hero…"
